Wednesday, August 30, 2006

I almost forgot!

I can't believe this, but I almost forgot to post about Marlene's yarn dyeing experience! When my mom told her friend Marlene that I dyed my own yarn, she was really impressed and excited to try it herself, so we bought some Gems Opal and got right down to it, with my mother looking on:Marlene went with varigated shades of sapphire blue, and her yarn turned out really well, don't you think?

I think I like it better than the similar skein I dyed a few months back, which was basically the same but lighter, and I think the darker is more striking. We didn't reskein it, but it looks lovely nonetheless. Hopefully she'll send me photos of the socks she makes with it, whenever that may be!

I also dyed some more yarn on my own last week, and I can show it now, because it should've gotten where it was going:

It's the pretty one on the right, as opposed to the lovely mohair on the left. I'm pretty happy with it, although it's got some white bits (adds character - totally done on purpose!). This was part of my final SP8 package to Lillian. Here is the whole box o' goodies:

I love this package, and I hope she liked it as well. We have the handpainted yarn, 4 skeins of mohair (better in the first photo), some "Footnotes," a pack of playing cards with a different drink recipe on each, and some handmade armwarmers. Better photo?These are a very slightly modified (made longer) version of the twisted rib armwarmers from Last-Minute Knitted Gifts, done in Noro Kureyon. I think it's colorway 40, or maybe 50, but I'm pretty sure it's something *0. It bothers me that they don't match, but I did try. I took apart the whole second skein trying to find the same color repeat, and it did not exist. See the long teal stretch on my left hand? Nothing like that in the other skein. I've had this problem with Kureyon before (and my Lady Eleanor in silk garden, but then I didn't really mind). I made Rachel some armwarmers last fall and I ended up cutting and pasting the yarn 4 times in the second one to make the stripes match. Yes, I'm anal like that. I figured though that these looked pretty cool and obviously go together, so I'm trying to be Zen about the whole thing. I'm hoping Lillian has slightly bigger (or at least longer) hands than I do, since these are a tad big for me...

Oh, the bamboo tank? Finished the front on Monday, so I was able to try it on. It fits perfectly, although it's a bit short. Then again, I was holding it on, so I'm not sure where it will actually fall, and it can always be blocked a bit longer. And it's not as transparent as I feared. So I'm charging ahead up the back, and should be done soon! I also, god forbid, worked a repeat of the Clapotis over the last couple of days, in a last-ditch effort to appease the Project Spectrum neutral gods. I really thought I could get that done in August, but that assumed I wouldn't have spent all my time working on the tank top, which I've knitted at lightning speed (for me - Rachel could've made 3 of them by now). Tonight is knitting club and I've got the tank and the clapotis, so there will be progress shots tomorrow!